DALLAS, Texas — It's no April Fool's joke for prosecutors, defendants, their attorneys, jurors, witnesses, investigators and any court-related staff in Dallas County.
According to records online, State District Judge Amber Givens plans to preside over more than 100 jury trials in the 282nd Court on April 1.
As of March 21, 111 were set for trial. The exact number that a jury will be seated for is unknown.
Several attorneys WFAA spoke to on Wednesday gave many labels to the upcoming judicial gauntlet: "ambitious," "refreshing," "impossible," and even "disappointing justice" were thrown out.
The bottom line is that judges throughout Texas are dealing with some degree of backlog from the COVID-19 pandemic. However, according to District Attorney John Creuzot, who was also a judge for 21 years, this is unprecedented.
Most district judges rarely see double-digit jury trials set for a single day, he told WFAA.
"I've never known this to happen," Creuzot told WFAA. Yet, Creuzot reminded WFAA that Givens was elected to serve that courtroom and that she could run it however she liked.
"She's entitled to set her docket how she wants," Creuzot said. "Will this be effective? Only time will tell."
But Creuzot is worried that a logjammed docket like this will leave the state and defense attorneys unprepared to meet their respective professional standards.
Evidence must be gathered and submitted, and police officers must be on standby to testify. Potential witnesses and experts must also be ready to go.
Prosecutors may not see every case go to a jury—a small fraction, if any—but they must prepare as if they all will.
Judge Givens didn't respond to an email from WFAA requesting a comment. But attorney Douglas Huff, a Dallas Criminal Defense Lawyers Association board member, admonished the move Thursday.
Huff was the former president of the association last year.
"I have not heard of this type of draconian enforcement in any other court," Huff said. "It's locking down both the state and the defense, trying to force things that shouldn't be quite forced yet. We're not fighting over a bank account or a contract--we're talking about human beings and their liberties. We're talking about people potentially spending years or life in prison, and every one of these cases is specific and has its own facts. It's not about doing it quickly--it's about doing it right."
Huff said that attorneys with cases in Dallas began coming to him and the association with complaints recently.
"It's not just absurd—it's an impossibility. One or two of those cases may go to trial, but the state has to prepare for all of those cases and be ready. And defense attorneys have to be ready. We're also not talking about small cases but about felony charges. Most courts see schedule four to five tops at a time. Maybe the high single digits or the double digits. Plenty of courts do this effectively across Texas and in Dallas. We don't see this in any other court," Huff said.
Former Dallas prosecutor and now defense attorney Heath Harris is not one of the attorneys complaining.
He said he had at least one case before Givens that day.
"My take is 'I'll be ready for trial.' I'll be ready the following week, too. People don't like change, and Judge Givens is trying to address a real problem that we have here, which is consistently delayed justice, not only for victims but also for citizens needing their cases addressed. I'm all for it," Harris said. "It encourages both parties to really ask, 'Are we going to trial?' Or 'Can we work this out?' If your case isn't scheduled or set--you usually don't do that. It's get passed, passed, and passed, and that's historically how things have happened in Dallas County."
Harris said those waiting in jail for their cases to be resolved would likely be handled first, followed by bond cases, which he said is pretty routine aside from the sheer number of cases set for April 1st.
"This is nothing new. She's running her court according to the law," Harris said.
Creuzot did tell WFAA that he had a personal conversation with Givens and that she mentioned a new state law as a possible motivation for the ambitious court scheduling.
That law was HB 1182 and requires trial courts to report monthly court activity stats, including the number of cases assigned to the court, the clearance rate for the court, the number of cases disposed by the court, the number of jury panels empaneled for the court, the number of continuances for an attorney before the court or by the court, the number of pleas accepted, the number of cases tried by the judge or a jury, and the number of cases tried before a visiting judge.
The county should publish the data on its website in a searchable format per the law.
"Currently, there are no rules or requirements that provide for the criminal courts to report data in the same individual format as the lower courts, leaving much of this information hidden from the public and the voters who elect judges for each of these courts," a bill analysis from the Judiciary & Civil Jurisprudence Committee read.
Without hearing from Givens, WFAA cannot determine why she chooses to stand out among other courts by scheduling so many trials in one day.
"People better be ready to come to work," Harris said.
"It's going to be a show," Huff said. "It's going to be disappointing for those looking for justice."
The Dallas Criminal Defense Lawyers Association lodged a criminal complaint against Givens for allegedly letting her court coordinator, Arceola Warfield, impersonate her and preside over a Zoom hearing in August 2021.
The Kaufman County District Attorney Erleigh Norville Wiley announced in September of last year she wouldn't bring criminal charges.
"No one at the hearing believed Judge Givens was on the call," Wiley wrote. "The evidence showed that the court reporter, and others, chided the court coordinator that they could not be 'on the record' because the judge was not on the Zoom call."
Wiley also said that Judge Givens and her defense team refused to cooperate in the investigation. In the headline of her news release, Wiley called the Dallas judge's conduct "unprofessional but not criminal."
"Having served as a judge for ten years in Kaufman County and conducting hundreds of hearings myself during that time, I believe that Judge Amber Givens should have done better that day and in the days after," Wiley wrote Friday. "There may be many reasons to censure the conduct of Judge Amber Givens, but as a prosecutor, I find there are no criminal reasons."
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